h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Good point...

"Why aren't gifs with transparant backgrounds used?"

Because then they couldn't use the fact that they only do blob to restrict the ability to upload pictures, thus avoiding the issue.



seriously though, the blobs work with the current system, and if they went to using gif as a format (or jpeg) then they would have to go back to using an ftp server for the images (although it should be possible to have an images subdirectory on the html server).

any comments from the techies?

AFAIK,...

"Blobs" is a collective term for images on the server, not a filetype. Most illustration blobs are GIFs, and many do use transparency. Photographic blobs are usually JPEGs, and I even spotted an MPEG movie that had been blobbed... (The "Douglas Adams in the bath" one that resurfaced for the Guide's last birthday)

Some blobs are identical for Alibastar or Goo, while some are different to blend in (or contrast) with the skins better. The different directories for each skin are just there to make this possible - when a new skin is enabled it will have a seperate blobs directory structure, populated with the versions of the image which are appropriate for that skin. (I still wish someone would add a white outline to in Goo... )

I don't have any special, priveleged knowledge of how the Guide works; I just read a lot of threads... I may have missed out something vital, but I think the above is probably substantially correct...

When people at the Post have submited artworks in the past, it has been neccessary to do different versions for the different skins. They get the same Blob number but are suffixed with the background colour in the filename. (Check out some of the HTML sources to see)

So Blob B123456 will be B12345white.gif in Alabaster.

A seperate question for those that know (hey that kinda rings) is what's the difference between gifs and pngs? I've used both on my websites and there doesn't seem to be anything between them, am I missing something?

PNG is yet another new format that has improvements in transparency and compression. However, it doesn't work on most older browsers.

I think there's less copyright issues with the compression algorithm, too, but I'm not sure and may be talking utter rubbish.

Primord wishes there was a smiley,
but plumps for or instead.

http://burnallgifs.org/ explains the GIF vs. PNG thing.

Hi everyone.

Important upgrade news here: F77636?thread=185819



Re your graphics questions, it's best to ask these in <./>Feedback</.> or they'll be missed, but the short answer is that h2g2's graphics are anti-aliased to specific background colours, and are exported as transparent GIFs. This provides optimum quality on the biggest number of browsers, but it does mean that all the blobs would need to be regenerated if they were to be usable on a skin with a different background colour to Goo or Alabaster (this is one reason the third skin has a white background for content that might contain pictures).

Happy to explain this further next week, but it's best done in the relevant section of <./>Feedback</.>, as otherwise those interested in upgrade dates but not in PNGs and GIFs may have unsubscribed, and they won't get this message. Thanks.

See you Monday. Enjoy the weekend everyone!

Mark.

I take it we can unsubscribe from here now?

Good idea.

*unsubscribe*

Seconded

*unsubscribes*

But in case you haven't:

F77636?thread=186230